Quote Originally Posted by Maxie the Taxi View Post
I don't know enough about the technical side of football to make a comment. I watch the game as a fan and am frustrated by the inability of a long-time, respected coach like Capers to devise a defense with the talent he has to shut down at least ONE aspect of the Saints' offense.

Ingram's performance was NOT Gale Sayers' like. He was running through mile-wide holes in our defense. And Brees had loads of time to throw.

I felt prior to the game that we had to pressure Brees to have any chance of winning. We didn't pressure Brees except on a handful of plays. To me it seemed like Capers couldn't commit to a game plan, kind of like a pro golfer who's not committed fully to a particular shot.

Did you watch the Pittsburgh/Indianapolis game? Dick LeBeau fully committed to pressuring Andrew Luck that game, no matter the consequences. He blitzed the house on most plays and Luck didn't have a prayer. LeBeau rushed so many people the Colts' RB's got hit by the traffic in the backfield, so their running game was stymied.

It seems football games are won in your opponents backfield. Nowadays pressure and penetration rule. I thought Dom initially brought that philosophy to Green Bay. Not now. Maybe we don't have the horses to get the job done.
I agree about pressure. ESPNWisconsin or someone referred to Pro Football Focus and said that the Packers blitzed on 10 of 35 Brees drop backs. He had a perfect passer rating on the throws without a blitz. I am a little dubious about that as I THINK Matthews caught him on a base pressure play (though there was no throw obviously).

But it goes without saying that if you go high pressure, you are going to get strafed by well timed runs with your pass rush unit out there. That is not really a threat with the Colts unless its Luck himself.

And that brings me around to the critical failure of this coach and this GM. They don't seem able to collect and develop the talent to get pass rush out of their base personnel. And as wist has pointed out, it becomes a tell. Now, if you can leverage it into favorable down and distance, then it doesn't matter. But as Capers said in the JSO writeup, without good tackling, it was too often 3rd and 2, not 3rd and 9.